Music

Readers' Choice: The Top 10 Boomer Albums

Boomers share the records that influenced them

Readers' Picks: 10 Music Albums Boomers Love

What were the essential albums of the boomer generation? AARP The Magazine asked music writer Nelson George to name his top ten, and then we put the question to you, the readers. Here are the records you picked, starting with your 10th place selection …

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10. 'Born to Run'

Bruce Springsteen wanted his ornate third album to sound like "Roy Orbison singing Bob Dylan, produced by Phil Spector"; after its 1975 release, Time and Newsweek put Springsteen on their covers in the same week.

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9. 'Goodbye Yellow Brick Road'

Elton John's 1973 double album spawned the hit Marilyn Monroe tribute "Candle in the Wind," later revised to memorialize Princess Diana after her 1997 death.

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8. 'The Dark Side of the Moon'

Pink Floyd's 1973 album has inspired a radio play by Tom Stoppard, track-by-track remakes by Phish and the Flaming Lips, and many a late-night college bull session.

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7. 'The Beatles (The White Album)'

Time has been kinder to this sprawling double album than some critics were in 1968: Nik Cohn panned it in the New York Times as "boring almost beyond belief."

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6. 'The Doors'

Powered by the breakout single "Light My Fire," the Doors' 1967 debut served as the dark cousin to sunnier pop fare during the Summer of Love.

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5.' Rumours'

The mega-selling Fleetwood Mac record, released in 1977, returned to the charts in 2011 after an episode of TV's Glee borrowed several tunes.

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4. 'Tapestry'

Singer-songwriter Carole King's 1971 release held the No. 1 position on Billboard's album chart for 15 consecutive weeks — and stayed on the chart for a staggering six-plus years.

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3. 'Hotel California'

No album embodied Me Decade hedonism quite like the Eagles' hit-packed chronicle of West Coast excess and anxiety from 1976.

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2. 'Bridge Over Troubled Water'

Simon and Garfunkel's 1970 album, anchored by the five-minute-long title track, would be the folk-rock duo's last studio recording together.

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David Rogowski

1. 'Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band'

The Beatles' psychedelic concept album blew teenage minds in 1967 and now sits atop Rolling Stone's list of the greatest albums of all time. It's also AARP readers' No. 1 pick for the essential boomer album.